Howard Lachtman

Howard Lachtman
Born
Howard Lawrence Lachtman
EducationM.A., Ph.D.[1]
Occupation(s)Critic, editor, author
Notable workSherlock Slept Here[2]

Howard Lawrence Lachtman is an American academic, literary critic, editor and author, who has written extensively on the life and works of Jack London, Arthur Conan Doyle,[1][3] and on crime fiction as a whole.[4]

Early life and career

Howard attended Lowell High School, UC Berkeley and UC Hastings Law,[5] and obtained his M.A and Ph.D. from University of the Pacific.[1]

Assessing Lachtman's contribution to a 1979 collection of London's own essays entitled Jack London: No Mentor But Myself, Los Angeles Times critic Sal Noto states:

This collection also contains a broad and perceptive foreword by Howard Lachtman, who has three books in the making on London. Lachtman shows the unfamiliar side of the London persona; he pares away much of the myth surrounding the man and offers a candid look at a writer who has all too often been dismissed or overlooked by critics of American literature.[6]

Reviewing Lachtman's 1982 anthology, Sporting Blood: Jack London's Greatest Sports Writing, the El Paso Herald-Post's David Innes notes that the book "could serve as a pattern for what a good theme anthology should be," adding that "Lachtman's introductory essay is a fine one, as are his short, scene-setting paragraphs."[7] Regarding the 1984 collection, Young Wolf: The Early Adventure Stories of Jack London, El Paso Times critic Dale L. Walker writes:

Lachtman's fine collection of London's early career adventure stories adds an important link to an astonishingly long chain of London stories published in the past two decades. [It] includes some of London's best early work. Here are 16 stories that ought to be read in high school and college classrooms today in lieu of the shopworn "To Build a Fire".[8]

Writing two years later in the same paper, Walker calls Lachtman's Sherlock Slept Here a "superb and authoritative little study [of] Arthur Conan Doyle's debt to the United States," commending in particular Lachtman's "thoroughly fascinating analysis of that most American of Holmes stories, 'The Adventure of the Noble Bachelor'."[2]

Lachtman also reviewed books—primarily mysteries—for the Los Angeles Times between 1976 and 1981, and, from 1977 to 1986, for the San Francisco Examiner.[9][10][11][12]

A decidedly unimposing fictional character named Howard Lachtman,[a] who happens to be at least the nominal leader of a small group of Sherlock Holmes devotees, figures prominently in Chapter II of Stuart Kaminsky's 1983 detective novel He Done Her Wrong.[13]

Works

Books

  • Sporting Blood: Selections from Jack London's greatest sports writing. Novato, CA : Presidio Press. 1981 OCLC 1151317362.
  • Young Wolf: The Early Adventure Stories of Jack London. Santa Barbara, CA : Capra Press. 1984. ISBN 9780884962106.
  • Sherlock Slept Here ; being a brief history of the singular adventures of Sir Arthur Conan Doyle in America, with some observations upon the exploits of Mr. Sherlock Holmes. Santa Barbara, CA : Capra Press. 1985. ISBN 088496227X.

Essays

Poetry

Notes

  1. ^ So unimposing, in fact, that the novel's narrator/protagonist promptly likens him to the aptly named, famously unimposing Hollywood character actor Donald Meek.

References

  1. ^ a b c Hastings, Jack (November 20, 1981). "Reading Room". Asbury Park Press. p. 40.
  2. ^ a b Walker, Dale L. (January 5, 1986). "Author Describes Conan Doyle's Love for U.S.". El Paso Times. p. 58.
  3. ^ Monsky, Susan (July 8, 1984). "Short Takes". The Boston Globe.
  4. ^ "Writers talk about craft". Sacramento City College Express. March 12, 1984. p. 5.
  5. ^ "They're Engaging: Lachtman-Corren". The San Francisco Examiner. January 12, 1964. Sec. Reviews, pg. 12.
  6. ^ Noto, Sal (June 24, 1979). "Jack London's Star on the Rise". Los Angeles Times Book Review p. 11. Retrieved July 1, 2022.
  7. ^ Innes, David (March 12, 1982). "Bookshelf". El Paso Herald-Post. p. 54. Retrieved July 1, 2022.
  8. ^ Walker, Dale L. (July 29, 1984). "Rekindled Interest Increases Jack London Collections". Los Angeles Times Book Review p. 58. Retrieved July 1, 2022.
  9. ^ Lachtman, Howard (November 7, 1976). "Fantasy Fiction by Jack London". Los Angeles Times. p. 225.
  10. ^ Lachtman, Howard (November 29, 1981). "West View". Los Angeles Times. p. 206.
  11. ^ Lachtman, Howard (May 29, 1977). "Street Smart and Courtroom Wise". The San Francisco Examiner. p. 249.
  12. ^ Lachtman, Howard (January 26, 1986). "The New Mysteries: Murder Among the Animals and Music". The San Francisco Examiner. p. 291.
  13. ^ Kaminsky, Stuart (1983). He Done Her Wrong. New York: St. Martin's Press. pp. 22–37 ISBN 9780312364915.
  14. ^ Lachtman, Howard (Winter 1970). Western Humanities Review. p. 30.
  15. ^ Lachtman, Howard (Winter 1972). Poet Lore. pp. 344–345.
  16. ^ Miner, Virginia Scott (February 6, 1972). "Kansas City's 10-Year Poetry Explosion". The Kansas City Star. p. 154, 157.
  17. ^ SoundingsMag. November 15, 2021.
  18. ^ SoundingsMag. December 2, 2021.
  19. ^ SoundingsMag. April 13, 2023.

Further reading